An Introductory Course of Modern Gymnastic Exercises (extract)

12 GYMNASTICS. powers speedily, aswell as effectually, was a desidera­ tum. With this view, a series of exercises with poles, bars, and ropes, similar in all essential particulars to those about to be explained, was devised and intro­ duced into all the Turn-pldtae, in addition to the usual routine of running, wrestling, and leaping with or with­ out poles. For some time afterthe defeat of Napoleon,these ex­ ercises continued to be patronized by the governments of Germany, and taught at all the public schools. It so happened, however, that the spirit which had been evoked to assert the rights of the old hereditary sove­ reigns, in opposition to Napoleon's new dynasty, was, like the demons of a magician, more ready to obey the spell-word which summoned it, than to depart when its task was accomplished. Among the loudest of the disappointed constitutionalists were some of the chief patrons of physical education. By some new and rather unintelligible logical process, the German rulers de­ monstrated to their own satisfaction that gymnastic exercises necessarilyengendered democratical principles; and in consequence all the public institutions for their promotion were at once suppressed. A few privateones are still winked at, and the military in some of the states receive regular lessons ; but the day of Gymnas­ tics is over in Germany. It is no new thing, however, to find a prophet, who has no honour in his own country, received with the most flattering empressement in another. Those exer­ cises, i n Germany have been subjected to the ban and anathema of the law, denounced as impious and sacrilegious, and driven back by the united influ-